Saturday 7 October, at 7.30pm

In association with Late Music 

VENUE:

Unitarian Chapel

St. Saviourgate 
York, YO1 8NQ

Tickets: £10 / £8 (concessions) / £3 (students)

This programme includes two major commissions, both addressing the issues of Human, Rights - Errollyn Wallen’s The Negro Speaks of Rivers and David Power’s Four Visiak Settings. 

Errollyn Wallen was born in Belize.  She gave up her training at the Dance Theater of Harlem, New York to study composition at the universities of London and Cambridge. She founded her own Ensemble X, and its motto  'We don't break down barriers in music,  we don't see any' reflects her genuine, free-spirited approach and eclectic musicianship. She has been commissioned by outstanding music institutions from the BBC to the Royal Opera House and performed her songs internationally.  We will be performing the world premiere of a new choral work Negro speaks of rivers, a setting of Langston Hughes' acclaimed poem.

The poet E.H. Visiak (born in London in 1878) was a convinced pacifist.  During WWI, when general conscription was introduced, he was exempted due to the work he did at the Indo European Telegraph Company. However Visiak took the view that this meant he was doing war work so he took a brave and principled stance and resigned his job, registering instead as a conscientious objector. David Power's new work - Four Visiak Settings - contrasts two of Visiak's anti war poems with earlier, more innocent work in an attempt to build up a musical picture of the 'journey' Visiak went on during this period of his life.

Ther rest of the conert embraces the Late Music Festival's them of women composers, and we trace music from the convent to the concert hall, from Hildegard de Bingen to a new commission by Errollyn Wallen.We will also be performing commissions by the choir, including The York Mass, commissioned from Kerry Andrew by the choir in 2008, which reflects Kerry’s diverse compositional styles, and Hilary Campbell's  All men are mortal  first performed for the York Viking festival in 2010, and draw on three tales of Viking folklore.

Kerensa Briggs and Rhiannon Randle were both finalists of the NCEM’s Young Composers Award.  Kerensa won the award in 2014, and Rhiannon was a finalist in 2017. The Ebor Singers have performed for the awards finals since it began in 2008.

Over the last few years, members of The Ebor Singers have recorded A-level choral compositions for Year 13 pupils of Camden High School for Girls, and we feature pieces Mabel Hoskins and Xenia Hasalam, both from the class of 2017.

Women hold up half the sky